[Note: These are the prepared notes for a sermonette given to the Portland, Oregon congregation of the United Church of God on Sabbath, March 2, 2024.]

According to Ward Lamon (as recorded by History.com), on the morning April 4, 1865, Abraham Lincoln dreamed about the “subdued sighs of mourners” observing a body laid in the East Room of the White House. When Lincoln, in his dream, inquired as to the identity of the dead man, he was told by a security guard that the president had been assassinated, which (naturally) caused him to wake up immediately. About a week later or so, he told Lamon that the dream had “strangely annoyed” him. Three days after that, he went to Ford’s Theater and was killed by John Wilkes Booth. We might say, if we believe this account to be genuine, that Abraham Lincoln had a premonition of his death, and if it is recorded accurately, he had an accurate one. It does not take strange dreams, though, for us to understand that we are mortal, though, and that we will perish at some point, as long as time takes its natural and inevitable course.

When we look at the question of the fate of the dead as far as the Bible is concerned, one of the most notable people we can look to as sources of the biblical position is King David. I recently spoke a great deal about King David’s response to God’s judgment on him for his sin, and when reading a passage of the Bible I commented that I would return to this passage as I had more to say about it, concerning David’s view of life after death, so let us now do so.

There are two main sources to determine what David thought about death, and let us take them in the order in which we find them. The first passage can be found in 2 Samuel 12:13-23. 2 Samuel 12 begins with the story of the theft of an innocent lamb that the prophet Nathan uses to convict David of his sins involving Bathsheba and Uriah. What he has to say about death in particular comes at the end of the passage, but I would like to read 2 Samuel 12:13-23 as a whole to give a larger context about David’s behavior and about how he viewed death. It reads: ”So David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.” And Nathan said to David, “The Lord also has put away your sin; you shall not die.  However, because by this deed you have given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also who is born to you shall surely die.”  Then Nathan departed to his house. And the Lord struck the child that Uriah’s wife bore to David, and it became ill.  David therefore pleaded with God for the child, and David fasted and went in and lay all night on the ground.  So the elders of his house arose and went to him, to raise him up from the ground. But he would not, nor did he eat food with them.  Then on the seventh day it came to pass that the child died. And the servants of David were afraid to tell him that the child was dead. For they said, “Indeed, while the child was alive, we spoke to him, and he would not heed our voice. How can we tell him that the child is dead? He may do some harm!” When David saw that his servants were whispering, David perceived that the child was dead. Therefore David said to his servants, “Is the child dead?” And they said, “He is dead.” So David arose from the ground, washed and anointed himself, and changed his clothes; and he went into the house of the Lord and worshiped. Then he went to his own house; and when he requested, they set food before him, and he ate.  Then his servants said to him, “What is this that you have done? You fasted and wept for the child while he was alive, but when the child died, you arose and ate food.” And he said, “While the child was alive, I fasted and wept; for I said, ‘Who can tell whether the Lord will be gracious to me, that the child may live?’  But now he is dead; why should I fast? Can I bring him back again? I shall go to him, but he shall not return to me.””

With regards to understanding David’s view of death, there are multiple aspects of this passage that interest us. The prophet Nathan had told David that the son born of adultery would die, and God struck the infant with sickness as soon as it was born as a demonstration of God’s judgment, although the child was certainly innocent of any sin in its conception. David’s response to his son being ill was to fast and pray and to seek God’s mercy on his son. He did not want his son to die for his sins, for he knew that is what he had been told would happen, and he still hoped to turn aside this judgment through his fasting and fervent prayer. Once God did not answer this prayer and the child died, David, contrary to the expectations of his advisors, washed, worshiped God and gave Him proper honor, despite his loss, and then went back home and ate. David understood that there was nothing he could do to bring his son back from death. He did not have power over death, only God did, and God had not chosen to be gracious to David in this matter. He properly understood that he would join his son in the grave. And so he did.

Later on, though, David lets us know that his understanding of what happens after death does not end with death and burial in the grave. Let us now turn to Psalm 16:8-11. Psalm 16 is one of the notable messianic psalms of the Bible, and this psalm has direct implications for Jesus Christ in particular and for the eternal life that will be enjoyed by faithful believers, as David was, in general. Psalm 16:8-11 reads: ”I have set the Lord always before me; because He is at my right hand I shall not be moved. Therefore my heart is glad, and my glory rejoices; my flesh also will rest in hope. For You will not leave my soul in Sheol, nor will You allow Your Holy One to see corruption. You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy; at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.”

Here, we see that David did not approach death with despair. Death was not the end of the story. He faced the inevitability of death with the hope of resurrection into eternal life. He understood that because God would not allow His Holy One to see corruption in the grave, but would raise Him alive, that all those who belong to God in the grave would similarly be shown the path of life and to enjoy pleasures forevermore at the right hand of the Eternal. With this hope and expectation of joy, he lived his life knowing that while he would die, death was not the ending of his story, but only the end of the beginning, as it were.

Though I do not wish to spend very much time on it, this refence to resurrection in Psalm 16 is not a on-off mention. As it happens, David alluded to his belief in the resurrection in Psalm 17:13-15. As this should be on the same page or the next page, we can look at it quickly. Psalm 17:13-15 reads: “Arise, O Lord, confront him, cast him down; deliver my life from the wicked with Your sword, with Your hand from men, O Lord, from men of the world who have their portion in this life, aand whose belly You fill with Your hidden treasure. They are satisfied with children, and leave the rest of their possession for their babes. As for me, I will see Your face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied when I awake in Your likeness.” Here David expresses that he is not satisfied with the passing pleasures of this mortal life, but that he wants to awake in the likeness of God Himself. This is what all believers desire for ourselves and for our brothers and sisters in Christ.

What does David’s view of what happens after death matter to us as Christians? Many people would look at David’s firm confidence both that he would die and be buried in the earth and that he would be resurrected as being just Old Testament stuff that does not matter now. As it happens, though, Peter quoted this passage of Psalm 16 in Acts 2, and right after quoting Psalm 16, Peter has the following to say in Acts 2:29-33. Acts 2:29-33 reads: ”“Men and brethren, let me speak freely to you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his tomb is with us to this day.  Therefore, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that of the fruit of his body, according to the flesh, He would raise up the Christ to sit on his throne, he, foreseeing this, spoke concerning the resurrection of the Christ, that His soul was not left in Hades, nor did His flesh see corruption.  This Jesus God has raised up, of which we are all witnesses.  Therefore being exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He poured out this which you now see and hear.” 

David knew that he would die, but He also had a vision of eternal life that would begin with the resurrection of the Messiah, who would also be the Son of David. And so Jesus Christ’s resurrection, of which the apostles (and others) were witnesses, was itself the down payment of the hope of eternal life that David had for himself and all other believers. Unlike, say, Abraham Lincoln, he did not merely dream of his own death, but he was given a vision of eternal life that he would enjoy, and in this hope he was able to endure the death that he faced as well as the loss of his newborn son whom he knew he would go to in the grave. And unlike many commentators and mainstream Christians, Peter knew that even after the resurrection of Jesus Christ, even up to the present day, David remains in the grave waiting for his resurrection into glory. But like we as Christians, David (and Peter as well) saw the resurrection of Jesus Christ as being the first step in the victory of God over death as a whole, and saw that the fulfillment of the resurrection of Jesus Christ the promise of eternal life for himself, and by extension for all believers. It is in that hope that we live, for we know that if time continues to pass on we will all be buried in the grave, but with the hope that Jesus Christ’s return will raise us and all who belong to Him into eternal life when He returns to this earth. May we all continue to live, as David did, in this blessed hope.